Description

Has the third wave of feminism in the United States spawned a literary movement? Is there a third wave equivalent of the consciousness-rasing novel? A lot has been written about the relationship of the third wave of feminism in the United States to the second wave, yet no one has examined works by young female writers as belonging to the third wave of feminism. This book fills the gap. Using tools of literary criticism to analyze the literary output of third wave feminism in the United States, Ungrateful Daughters looks at the main anthologies of third wave writings, paying attention to their structure, production process and narrative forms used in the individual pieces. It also attempts to define third wave fiction and analyze the memoirs and novels coming from writers who could be classified as third wave (specifically, Rebecca Walker, Danzy Senna and Michelle Tea), tracing how these books exhibit third wave sensibility and reflect generational experiences of third wave writers. A lot of attention is devoted to comparisons of second and third wave feminism and the ambivalent relationship of third wave feminism to postfeminism. Wendy Kaminer wrote in True Love Waits: If it ultimately fails as a liberation movement, feminism will at least have achieved considerable literary success. Ungrateful Daughters examines whether the literary success helps or hinders the cause of women's liberation.